DEVELOPMENT FUND FOR PAPER INDUSTRY BEING CONSIDERED
Shri Balasaheb Vikhe Patil, Minister of Heavy
Industries and Public Enterprises has said he would recommend
to the Government the setting up of a Fund for the development
of Paper Industry . Shri Patil was speaking at an interactive
session with the paper and newsprint industry here today. The
Minister also said that an Inter-Ministerial Round Table to discuss
various issues concerning the industry will be organised. Shri
Patil urged the industry to become world-class and world-scale
by investing suitably in upscaling the capacities and upgrading
the process technology to align with the emerging techniques of
cleaner and more eco-friendly processes and practices especially
in the context of stringent environmental regulations. He complimented
the paper industry for their efforts on pollution abatement and
accreditation of the Environmental Management System (EMS) to
the ISO 14001 by several integrated mills.
Dr. Vallabhbhai Kathiria, Minister of State for
Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises urged the industry to
take up large scale farm and social forestry activities and thereby
generate employment opportunities in the informal sector through
a win-win partnership with owners of large tracts of land.
Shri B.N.Jha, Secretary, Department of Heavy
Industries, said on paper industry should address the sustainability
issues right now through massive farm and social forestry efforts.
He pointed out opportunities for attaining cost effectiveness
while improving energy efficiency and maximizing the fibre recovery
through applications of bio-technology in genetically engineered
high-yielding and quick-yielding pulpwood species.
The Industry representatives brought up several
issues plaguing the industry – non availability of appropriate
fibre resources at affordable prices, imbalances in the customs
duty structure with abysmally low level of customs duty on Newsprint
and Light Weight Coated (LWC) paper imports, leading to disguised
import of writing and printing paper under the garb or Newsprint
or LWC, the diversion of bagasse for use as feedstock for power
generation before fibre recovery, indiscriminate dumping of newsprint
at incredibly low prices, import duty on inputs and intermediates
being much higher than that on finished product. To remedy the
fibre shortage, the industry pleaded for permission to utilize
large tracks of degraded forest land for large-scale captive plantation
of pulpwood species and zero duty on waste paper imports
